Page 92 of Serenade Me

Chapter Thirty

Marius

She hasn’t come out of her room all day, and I’ve stayed mostly in mine, except for pacing in front of her door, waiting to see if she’ll answer my knock. I’ve thought a lot about what she said, and the truth is, I can see where she’s coming from.

I can’t say that what she told me about what she’s suffered in the past hasn’t affected my desire to protect her. I just can’t imagine how much strength it took to recover from what happened with the Maestro, and the last thing I want is to ever see her hurt again.

Now I’m the one who’s hurt her. Me. There’s really no reason Anca, and even Jez, ever should speak to me again. I get that.

I just have to trust her, as she’s asked.

I set the alarm to wake me in time for the night’s performance and fall asleep to images of her with tears in her eyes.

***

“Where’s Anca?” I ask later, poking my head out of the green room we have put aside for our meditation.

“I haven’t seen her,” one of the crew answers as he rushes off with a pile of cords looped around his hand.

Damn. I check my watch. Twenty minutes until curtains up. I won’t have time to go through the meditation routine with her if she doesn’t show soon.

Why isn’t she here?

I try to push her out of my mind as I sit and close my eyes and breathe.

***

“Where’s Anca?” I ask Jez as we get into position on stage, and he just shrugs without looking at me.

“She didn’t come meditate with me,” I tell him, and his head jerks up and he turns towards to wings.

“She’ll be okay,” he mumbles, though I’m not sure who he’s trying to convince.

“I hope so,” I say, again, to him or to myself, I’m not sure.

The lights go out, and there’s nowhere to go but forward.

***

“She is the sensation, you’ve all been waiting to see! Our very own harpist from heaven, ANCA PETRESCU!”

Sebastian intro echoes throughout the venue and the crowd cranks up their cheers to full volume.

I watch and wait. But there’s no movement from the wings.

Sebastian shoots a look at me and I nod, and twirl my finger, urging him to draw out the intro.

“If you were at our concert last week on the esplanade, you would have heard her perform a kick ass version of Beautiful, but that’s got NOTHING on what she’s prepared for you for tonight! GIVE IT UP FOR ANCA!!!!”

It takes a few more moments before I see her emerge from behind the curtain.

She gives the crowd a small wave as she walks over to the harp and settles down on the stool.

“Breath, baby, just breathe,” I urge her under my breath. Her movements seem stiff and tense.

The stage lights dim to focus on the one spotlight lighting a perfect circle around Anca and her harp.

The noise from the audience slowly dies into nothing as she raises her arms.